Ryan Magee Blog

The economy added 227,000 jobs in February and surpassed economists’ expectations, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Employment improved in professional and business services, health care and social assistance, leisure and hospitality, manufacturing, and mining. The official unemp...

Sales of distressed properties, including short sales and REO transactions, put downward pressure on home prices. For this reason, CoreLogic’s Home Price Index measures values including and excluding distressed sales. In January, the index showed a month-over-month decline of 1.0 percent and a 3....

Each month, Fannie Mae’s National Housing Survey polls Americans to assess their attitudes toward homeownership, renting, mortgage rates, the economy, their personal finances, and overall consumer confidence. February’s survey found respondents’ attitudes stabilizing and more confident in the eco...

According to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s Weekly Applications Survey, the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 2.1 percent from the week before as average mortgage rates dipped. Despite the continued improvement in demand for loan applications to purchase homes, the Market Composite...

Here's the mortgagee letter for changes coming on FHA on or after 4/9/12. http://portal.hud.gov/hudportal/documents/huddoc?id=12-04ml.pdf Summary - their upfront fee and monthly mortgage insurance is increasing. However, if you have an FHA loan now and are looking at an FHA streamline, ,they upfr...

Clear Capital’s latest Home Data Index finds the rate at which home prices are declining has begun to improve. In February, home prices were just 1.9 percent below year-before levels, the slowest rate of decline since April 2011. Regionally, home prices were down in the West and Midwest, while va...

The Obama administration on Tuesday announced another initiative to allow more homeowners to refinance, this time by dropping fees on federally insured mortgages that have prevented some borrowers from taking advantage of ultralow rates over the past year. The latest changes will reduce fees to r...

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and U.S. Department of the Treasury released their February 2012 Housing Scorecard, which compiles key market data and the results of the administration’s recovery efforts through the end of January. According to the report, the supply of exist...

Periodically, the Federal Reserve collects economic data from the 12 Fed districts around the country and releases the findings in a report known as the Beige Book. In its latest report, which includes data through February 17, the Fed says economic activity has continued to increase at a modest ...

RealtyTrac’s Year-End 2011 U.S. Foreclosure Sales Report shows homes in some stage of foreclosure accounted for 24 percent of all residential home sales during the fourth quarter of 2011. But though that represents an increase from the previous quarter it is 2.0 percent below the fourth quarter o...